Three quarters of a century ago, when Britain was fighting for her life and the freedom of Europe, no important body of opinion would have questioned the value of patriotism or the importance of preserving and cherishing our nationhood as a focus of resistance to Nazi totalitarianism. Pride in our heritage, our sense of connection with the past and with the achievements of our forebears, were not only second nature to millions of people in the Britain of 1940, but were widely shared throughout the English-speaking world and helped to mobilise opinion against Hitler. Men and women in the United States and the British Dominions drew strength and inspiration in these years of crisis from their common historical and cultural roots, and these were celebrated in literature and song, on the screen and printed page, from one end of the world to the other. Penguin Books, to cite a typical example, published two anthologies during this period – Portrait of England and Forever Freedom – which are a treasure trove of prose and verse celebrating our Island story. They sing the praises of our countryside and institutions, our traditions and people, in the words of Shakespeare and Milton, Emerson and Whittier, Burke and Jefferson, and countless others.
Today, however, such sentiments strike a jarring note and are generally ridiculed by so-called 'liberal' opinion as outdated, narrow-minded, and even (in the eyes of some) 'racist'. We are told, instead, that the nation-state is an anachronism, and that truly enlightened people should embrace, as a long-term objective, the supranationalist vision of world government. In the meantime, it is argued, rather than clinging nostalgically to the idea of national sovereignty, the preservation of peace and international co-operation requires, in the case of Europe, continued progress towards the establishment of a single supranational European State. To quote the words of Philip Kerr (Lord Lothian), written in the 1930s and prominently displayed in the Visitor Centre of the European Parliament building in Brussels: "National sovereignty is the root cause of the most crying evils of our time and of the steady march of humanity back to tragic disaster and barbarism…The only final remedy for this supreme and catastrophic evil of our time is a federal union of the people."
This paper accepts none of these assertions. It will argue, on the contrary, that the drive to abolish national sovereignty and create a European State, and the ideal of world government, represent a betrayal of the liberal internationalist tradition and are a serious threat to the long term survival of freedom and democracy. True internationalism does not, like the European Union, seek to create new structures of State power to rule over previously independent nations. Rather, it embodies and expresses a spirit of generous sympathy and co-operation between sovereign countries, based on mutual respect for each other's traditions, institutions, and liberties. Far from requiring the destruction of patriotism, liberal internationalism recognises the vital role it plays in binding together and sustaining free societies. This paper will also argue that the widespread belief that nationalism is the "root cause" of war and "the most crying evils of our time," is historically inaccurate, philosophically confused, and politically naïve. And finally, to counter the common charge that 'Brexiters' and other opponents of European integration are anti-European xenophobes, this paper will argue that contrary to decades of propaganda from the EU and its supporters, the true glory of Europe, and the secret of her creativity and dynamism as a civilisation, has lain in decentralisation and diversity rather than in size and empire.
The link between patriotism, nationhood, and internationalism
To begin to understand the libertarian internationalist case for patriotism and national sovereignty, travel back in time to a political meeting on an autumn day in late Victorian England. There, in a speech at Dartford, in Kent, on 2nd October 1886, Lord Randolph Churchill emphasised the liberating role Britain had played in European history since the 16th century:
"The sympathy of England with liberty, and with the freedom and independence of communities and nationalities," he declared, "is of ancient origin, and has become the traditional direction of our foreign policy…It was mainly English effort which rescued Germany and the Netherlands from the despotism of King Philip II of Spain, and after him from that of Louis XIV of France. It was English effort which preserved the liberties of Europe from the desolating tyranny of Napoleon." And, "In our own times," he concluded, "our own nation has done much, either by direct intervention or by energetic moral support, to establish upon firm foundations the freedom of Italy and of Greece."
Had he not subsequently died at such a tragically young age, Lord Randolph could have completed his 1886 summary of Britain's liberating role in European history by noting that together with her allies, and under the leadership of his own son, she freed the European continent from the scourge of Nazism and Fascism in 1945.
Some years before that speech of Lord Randolph Churchill's in Dartford, a similar note was struck by an older Victorian contemporary, J.R. Wreford (1800 - 1881), who wrote a famous poem containing these memorable lines:
"Lord, while for all mankind we pray,
Of every clime and coast,
O hear us for our native land,
The land we love the most…"
Here, then, we have two typical expressions of 19th century British patriotism – a speech and a poem – both of which testify eloquently to the fact that love for one's own country in no way implies a lack of regard or sympathy for the cultures, institutions, patriotic loyalties or interests of other nations, just as our love for our families does not prevent us developing good relationships with our friends and neighbours, or indeed with strangers. That this should be the case ought not to surprise us, despite all the politically correct globalist and pro-EU propaganda about the supposedly 'selfish' and 'bigoted' nature of 'nationalism'.
Whilst it is true that human sympathy and feelings of solidarity are naturally strongest when they reflect a sense of common interest and identity rooted in shared values and a common heritage, it does not mean that they remain confined within those limits. We first develop our sense of connection with others within those "little platoons" about which Edmund Burke, the father of British Conservatism, waxed so lyrical in the 18th century – that is, within our families, localities, and regions. But then, by a natural process of experience and discovery, we go on to perceive our links with a wider community and learn to identify with the country and nation whose language and culture plays such a key role in shaping our minds and lives. If, in addition, we have grown up in a liberal democracy like Britain, we also learn to identify with other societies which share our commitment to liberty and the rule of law – especially if, like Australia, New Zealand, Canada or the United States, they are linked to us historically as former colonies. Human sympathy, in other words, grows naturally out of a widening circle of association, and the very fact that we love our country and are proud of its achievements and traditions, helps us to appreciate the patriotic sensibilities and feelings of other nationalities, and can bring out the best in us rather than the worst.
Patriotism is a noble sentiment compatible with other loyalties
As British Conservative philosopher and statesman, Arthur Balfour (1848-1930), put it long ago in his 1913 lecture on 'Nationality and Home Rule':
"The sentiment of nationality is one of a group of such sentiments for which there is unfortunately no common name. Loyalties to a country, a Party, a constitution, a national sovereign, a tribal chief, a church, a pact, a creed, are characteristic specimens of the class. They may be ill-directed; they often are. Nevertheless it is such loyalties that make human society possible; they do more, they make it noble. To them we owe it that a man will sacrifice ease, profit, life itself, for something which wholly transcends his merely personal interests. Therefore, whether mistaken or not, there is in them always a touch of greatness. But it has to be observed that the kind of loyalty we call patriotism, though it expresses a simple feeling, need have no exclusive application. It may embrace a great deal more than a man's country or a man's race. It may embrace a great deal less. And these various patriotisms need not be, and should not be, mutually exclusive.
It is therefore no coincidence, that this Scottish and British patriot should have felt a generous sympathy for the national aspirations of the Jews after centuries of suffering and exile. It is not strange that he should have lent his name to that famous declaration of 1917 (the 'Balfour Declaration') promising British support for the re-establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.12345671 Readers who may question the moral legitimacy of the Balfour Declaration and Zionism in general, should read my web paper, In Defence of Israel: key facts about the Arab-Israeli conflict (32 pp), posted on 2 Dr Alan Sked, Good Europeans? (London: the Bruges Group, Occasional Paper 4, November 1989).
3 For more details see: op cit, In Defence of Israel, p.26.
4 For full details go to 5 To read the full text of the Declaration go to 6 Ibid for further details.
7 For fuller details, see: R.J. Rummel, Death by Government (Transaction Publishers, USA, 1996), and The Black Book of Communism (Harvard University Press, USA, 1999).